FIRST Robotics Competition

I was able to explore my interest in mechanical engineering as early as in high school by joining my school's FIRST Robotics team.

I focused my involvement on CAD and mechanical design and quickly became proficient in SolidWorks, which allowed me to develop a number of engineering designs. When the pandemic hit, the knowledge of CAD became especially useful to me because I was able to dedicate the extra time I had towards expanding my engineering and design skills while social distancing at home.

Skills developed:

  • Mechanism design

  • System integration

  • Component selection

  • Gearbox design

Software utilized:

  • SolidWorks (CAD, drawings)

The telescoping arm on this robot was a design that I was lucky to see come to life and perform in a competition. 

I designed this mechanism to enable the transfer of game pieces between high and low locations on the game field. The arm pivots around its mounting point and is able to extend and retract using a rack and pinion system. This 2-degree-of-freedom system allows the robot to have a wide range of motion for retrieving the game pieces during the competition.

I designed and modeled this three-stage continuous rope elevator during the pandemic. 

It is designed to extend to its full height of 7 feet in about 8 seconds; it is also able to lift up the robot it's mounted onto in about 15 seconds by retracting the elevator while hanging on a hook attached to the top carriage. 

To optimize for both high-speed extension and high-torque retraction, I designed this system to be powered via a custom shifter gearbox with two gear ratios and a pneumatic shifter mechanism.